Convention Ups & Downs

In the spirit of the many of the interesting (and often very rotation-happy; see “the Quayle regime” here, “we have always been at war with Eurasia and were always neutral in the AG race” here, “it’s all the fault of township officials” here, or interesting revisionism here) post-mortems put forward on the outcome of the GOP state convention, I have decided to join in the fun.

On the evening immediately after the convention, the Hoosier Access guys joined Chris Spangle, Adam Longworth, and Mitch Harper at the South Bend Chocolate Company on Monument Circle in Indy for a podcast. We did an “up and down” round table, and my post-mortem is based around that basic concept.

(Read more after the leap)

Mitch Daniels
It’s true that the Governor’s candidate got thumped. The Governor’s people apparently went to incredible lengths to get Jon Costas elected. It’s also true that the Governor has had problems with the base and grassroots of his own party.

But in losing on Monday, Mitch Daniels emerged the big winner. The convention delegates took a bite out of Mitch Daniels, but in so doing they vented. The process was cathartic. They exorcised their frustrations now, and the pressure building up there was released. The party base and grassroots, having gotten their man and “showed the Governor” will now almost certainly be more likely to support him and to work for him for November.

During his speech, Mitch looked an awful lot like the guy Republicans fought hard to get elected four years ago. The convention speech was a reminder to the delegates of why they liked Mitch Daniels, and the delegates gave Mitch Daniels a reminder of why the party and the base matter (and why they should be treated better), particularly after how much they did to help him in 2004. Both have benefited from the convention experience.

The Zoeller victory also opens the door for a southern strategy by Daniels that could crack wide open one of the few Democrat strongholds in the state, create an enduring realignment in the legislature in favor of House Republicans, deliver to Congress one of the GOP’s few potential Congressional pick-ups, and within a few years place state Democrats into an utterly untenable position as a permanent minority party.

Greg Zoeller
The dapper deputy attorney general is now the general election favorite to replace his boss. A man of character and class, he now stands tall. Overcoming the Indy establishment was probably the hard part, and he did it handily.

Kudos also go to Jim Banks and everyone on Zoeller’s team; they ran a tight ship in a very stormy sea.

The People of Valparaiso
They got to keep their mayor. And, even though people elsewhere in the state might strongly disagree with his policies, they seem to like them just fine. Mr. Costas will go on to ably serve them for many years to come.

Becky Skillman
The decisive and thorough destruction of Jon Costas’ AG hopes at the hands of the state party’s convention delegates swept aside all talk that Jon Costas was a potential heir to Mitch Daniels. In so doing, the convention also cleared yet another obstacle out of the path of the lieutenant governor, should she decide to run for governor in 2012.

Her convention demonstration was impressive and her video was slick and persuasive. Skillman spent the convention, and the entire weekend before it, mingling among the delegates. She was out in the open, listening, talking, and communicating. She visited the receptions on Sunday night. She attended the caucuses. She worked the convention floor and the booth area outside.

Mitch Daniels, in contrast, was bottled up somewhere else by his staff (who seem to want to hide him from the very party that elected him). He did not attend the receptions. He did not visit the caucuses. He did not mindle with the delegates. He stayed concealed behind the stage curtain most of the time and barely even shook hands with anyone in the crowd save for a few brief moments. Members of Congress, mayors, and state legislators mingled. Governor Daniels did not.

The contrast was stark.

The GOP Base
They won. They claimed their pound of flesh. They elected their man. They stuck it to the Indy establishment. They stuck it to the Governor. And they went home happy and more likely than ever to work for the Governor in the general.

Steve Carter
The Attorney General fought the powers-that-be, and he won. His deputy got his party’s nomination to succeed him, despite countless elected officials lining up against him. A great man to the end, and respected by all. He, perhaps more than anyone, helped Greg Zoeller win.

Carl Brizzi
The Marion County Prosecutor also fought his county’s powers-that-be, and he also won. His speech nominating Greg Zoeller was energetic, polished, and persuasive. I expect to see Carl Brizzi standing at the state convention podium again someday, and it will be to receive a nomination, not to give one.

Mike Sodrel
The 9th District’s former Congressman got what were easily the convention’s most enthusiastic cheers and loudest applause. It was even more surprising that it came from pretty much only about a ninth of the people present at the convention.

The inherent GOP “southern strategy” that will come with a ticket that includes Tony Bennett (of Clark County), Greg Zoeller (of Floyd County), and Becky Skillman (of Lawrence County) will inevitably serve–directly or indirectly–to help Sodrel in his bid to yet again unseat Baron Hill.

Blogs
No, blogs did not elect Greg Zoeller. They did not elect Greg Ballard either. Blogs never elect anyone. I’m too modest to think that I (or any other blog) had a decisive impact in this race (though many have told me what I and others did was very important; the bitterness and anger of some that lost is probably a good indication of something too).

But what blogs have done is provided unprecedented transparency to a process that would have otherwise happened entirely in the shadows. Never again will a state party in Indiana hold a convention where delegates will be strong-armed. No candidate will want to risk the backlash that would come with being exposed.

And the blogs provided an important source of information on an election campaign that was very poorly covered by the media. They saw extensive debate of many issues concerning the two candidates, and provided an important vetting of the candidates and their campaigns as well. They gave an easily-available and easily-readable voice to things that would otherwise have never been widely known.

For all of the talk early on about how Costas’ campaign was revolutionary in its use of a website, email to communicate with delegates, and YouTube for campaign videos (and even its early outreach to bloggers with that conference call), it was the discussion on the blogs and the breaking of news by them that was truly revolutionary. No contested convention campaign in Indiana is going to be able to ignore blogs in the future.

The blogs were overwhelmingly for Zoeller. His victory, in some part, is by extension their victory too.

Update:

Lewis and Wilkins
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention LAW. This plucky little Indianapolis law firm was alone in standing by and supporting Greg Zoeller. In fact, his campaign was run from a conference room at LAW’s offices overlooking Monument Circle. Ironically, this conference room used to be the office of Tom John, the Marion County GOP chair who later went to work for Ice Miller. LAW went against the big Indy law firms–no small challenge–and they won.

Mitch Daniels’ Staff
The Governor’s peeps (campaign and office), whether working behind the scenes or as delegates appointed by Tom John in the Marion County GOP Chair’s convention packing scheme, were utterly unable to deliver a victory for the man their boss had endorsed. Not only did they fail to deliver a victory to Jon Costas, but word of their apparent use of antiquated strong-arm tactics spread via the internet and caused a backlash that contributed to the impressive margin of Zoeller’s victory.

The ill-feeling created by such ham-handed, arrogant, and incompetent efforts fortunately evaporated in the wake of the Zoeller win. Had Costas won, the damage they had caused would have been permanent.

Hopefully, the Governor will learn from the bungling of his underlings before they ruin something else that can’t be so easily undone (like his reelection chances). Maybe another round of reprisal firings is in order; heaven knows at least these would be more well-deserved.

These are arrogant, bullying people who have yet to realize that they will get much further with the base of the party with friendship, respect, and persuasion (see also above what Becky Skillman did at the convention that Mitch’s staff did not let him do). Have they even realized that they need the base of the party? Given that it just handed them their rear ends, one could hope so. Elections are won outside of the mile square, not inside of it.

Jon Costas
The mayor of Valparaiso got turned into base and blogger barbecue. His campaign relied heavily upon big-bucks efforts and establishment pressures, none of which were sufficient to overcome the sentiments of the delegates (whether against the Governor, for Zoeller, against Costas, or in support of Steve Carter).

Costas is an able mayor, a man of character, and has a capable intellect. He’ll be back in some other capacity someday. He just won’t be attorney general this go around, nor will he be speculated upon any further as the heir to Mitch Daniels’ legacy.

Tom John
The chairman of the Marion County GOP worked hard to deliver his county for the Governor’s man. He packed his delegate appointments with dependable votes obtained by appointing Mitch staffers, campaign workers, lobbyists, and their spouses (among others). He also reportedly demanded loyalty oaths that saw such pro-Zoeller GOP leaders as Lawrence Mayor Paul Ricketts and Marion County Prosecutor Carl Brizzi shut out of the county’s delegation.

In the end, however, his packing scheme failed to help Jon Costas carry the day and it caused a popular backlash on the internet and out in the rest of the state that probably more than offset the gains such tactics provided. Though he could rely upon the chairman’s authority to appoint delegates, he was woefully unable to persuade them; Zoeller carried Marion County’s elected delegates by a slightly better margin than he carried the state at large.

It was Dave Miller, not Tom John, who was left with a big smile on their face at the end of the convention (Miller was reportedly fired from his party post by John over the AG race).

John Waterman
When the results of the AG’s race were announced, a lot of the wind went out of John Waterman’s sails. He may yet find support for a third-party bid. I bet that a lot of people, mostly Democrats eager to hurt Mitch Daniels, will be willing to sign his campaign petition.

I had thought that the Waterman bid was a response from 8th District Republicans to answer delegate strong-arming in Indy and elsewhere, and suspected that the Waterman candidacy would disappear if Zoeller won the convention.

If Howey is any indication, however, Waterman and others remain as determined as ever to make a go with an independent bid. Regardless, their pool of potential supporters shrank when Zoeller triumphed.

The Indy Establishment
A catch-all phrase for everything from the State Party to the big Indy law firms. Their support seems to be the kiss of death in Indiana politics these days; just ask Bart Peterson. The big law firms put forward a former alumnus of Barnes & Thornburg and hoped to take the AG’s office and perhaps restore the gravy train of legal outsourcing.

In this, they failed. Linda Pence is unlikely to want to cozy up to them, given what happened to Peterson and how the taking of the big bucks contributions from them will play with the public at large. Greg Zoeller is unlikely to change Steve Carter’s policy of outsourcing, so he may well call upon Pence to pledge to do the same.

Indiana Democratic Party
What can I say? The recent GOP spat looks like two buddies arm-wrestling compared to the bloody trench warfare going on on the Democrat side, both at the state and national levels.

Thursday, Jill Long Thompson stomped all over Linda Pence’s AG campaign announcement. I’m sure it had nothing to do with Pence being aligned with the Bayh faction of the party.